


a culmination of miracles

by prettydizzeed



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Author is disabled, Biblical References, Chronic Pain, Disability, Disabled Character, Domestic, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-17
Updated: 2019-06-17
Packaged: 2020-05-13 17:53:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,338
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19256215
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/prettydizzeed/pseuds/prettydizzeed
Summary: “Do you remember the, ah, the bit about the serpent, after the ordeal with the apple and such? Cursed above all the cattle and every beast of the field, upon thy belly thou shalt go, dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life, et cetera?”Aziraphale nods.“And here I am, not, you know, crawling on my belly, obviously, so. Got to be punished for that prolonged bout of disobedience.” Crowley shrugs, then hides the accompanying wince.Aziraphale’s brow wrinkles. “I’m afraid I don’t understand—”“I’m in pain, angel. All the time. It’s just kind of…” He waves a hand. “How things are."





	a culmination of miracles

**Author's Note:**

> the reason Crowley walks Like That is because he has chronic pain
> 
> warning for some minor, unintentional ableism. also, just as a note, I'm against the concept that chronic pain/disability is a punishment from God or someone/thing else, but I think in this case it's Crowley's perspective of the situation.
> 
> this fic is now also available in Russian! thank you so much to энрин for the translation!  
> читать по-русски

it took a culmination of miracles,

miracles just for me to be here

i say. it took a culmination of

miracles just to be

— **Destiny Hemphill,** from “snapshot: lucinda braiding blue violets into nellie’s hair (c. 1915),” [ _Oracle: A Cosmology_ ](https://t.umblr.com/redirect?z=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.honeysuckle.press%2Fbooks%2Foracle&t=MTYzYjY0MDVkZTZlZjQyMzczYzA0YWE4YTEwMjg2ZDE1ZWZhN2Y4Ziw1ZFh0SWZhcQ%3D%3D&b=t%3A-RcvR0Ukq319jRWhx51YZg&p=https%3A%2F%2Fcrippleprophet.tumblr.com%2Fpost%2F177901126576%2Flifeinpoetry-it-took-a-culmination-of-miracles&m=1)

 

The first thing he does in this body is stumble.

Well, that’s not quite true—the first thing he does in this body is talk to the angel, ragged and raw and trying to cover it with self-assurance and a smooth stream of borderline taboo small talk. But after that, the thunder groans and the animal of his mind cowers and the animal of his body tries to send him face-first into the dirt, tries to remind him it’s impossible to slither away if upright.

He catches himself. Takes another step closer to the angel, partially to maintain his balance and partially because the animal of his body is suddenly and desperately afraid.

It should be the other way around, of course; the angel should incite more bone-deep terror than any amount of clamor and destruction in the clouds. The other demons, he’s sure, love storms. But the other demons’ bodies, he’s sure, don’t feel this fragile, this close to cracking open simply from the force of _being_.

The angel lifts his wing, and his body doesn’t even flinch, doesn’t even consider the chance of being hit. The world is changed, and his body is changed, and he feels something irrevocable screaming along the curve of his spine, but for now, he is dry.

*

“It’s not a long walk, my dear,” Aziraphale says. Despite the pet name, he sounds frustrated, like he thinks Crowley is being ridiculous, like he’s close to walking out the door without him.

“Even shorter to miracle,” Crowley retorts, half into the pillow, from where he’s sprawled across the couch.

“It’s a nice day,” Aziraphale says, and then without pausing, like he already knew that’d make no difference, “Besides, if we were to miracle there, someone might see us.”

“Can jus’ make them forget about it,” Crowley says without opening his eyes.

“That’s _wrong_.”

“Oh, like you’ve never done it,” Crowley snaps, but he doesn’t turn his head to roll his eyes where Aziraphale can see it.

“In—in _dire circumstances_ ,” Aziraphale protests, “not merely because I’m too lazy to—”

“I _can’t_ , angel, okay?” Crowley says. Clicks his teeth shut, and breathes through his nose for a few beats, and lets out a sigh. “I can’t.”

Aziraphale blinks, harshness falling away, posture shifting from condescending to concerned. “You can’t what, my dear?” he asks gently, brow furrowed.

Crowley screws his eyes shut further and, anticipating that this is about to be a long conversation, sits upright, biting down hard on the inside of his mouth while doing so. He runs a hand over his face and tries to wrap his mind around the weight of a six thousand year old confession—one of several, and he’s not sure where it ranks in terms of the difficulty of forming the words.

“I can’t walk that far right now,” he says, looking just to the left of Aziraphale’s face. “It hurts too much.”

Aziraphale’s concern deepens; his hands flex like he wants to reach out and check to see if Crowley’s skin is all intact. “Hurts? Did you injure yourself?”

Crowley swallows. Sighs. “No, it’s—it’s always like this, Aziraphale. It’s just a bit worse than usual at the moment.”

“Always like—Crowley, what do you mean? What’s wrong?”

Crowley looks down at his hands for a moment, trying to find the words. Well. Maybe better to use Someone else’s, this time. “Do you remember the, ah, the bit about the serpent, after the ordeal with the apple and such? Cursed above all the cattle and every beast of the field, upon thy belly thou shalt go, dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life, et cetera?”

Aziraphale nods.

“And here I am, not, you know, crawling on my belly, obviously, so. Got to be punished for that prolonged bout of disobedience.” Crowley shrugs, then hides the accompanying wince.

Aziraphale’s brow wrinkles. “I’m afraid I don’t understand—”

“I’m in pain, angel. All the time. It’s just kind of…” He waves a hand. “How things are. A side effect of the form.” He gestures at himself and doesn’t miss how Aziraphale’s gaze catches on his hips, however briefly.

“But… I…” Aziraphale pauses, visibly rejecting several initial responses. He closes his eyes for a moment and takes a breath before looking back at Crowley. “How long has this been ‘how things are,’ my dear?” he asks, so gently it hurts, as if he’s just run his thumb along each of Crowley’s vertebrae.

“...Forever?” Crowley offers weakly, almost shrugging again but thinking better of it. “I mean, you know, not _forever_ forever, but—since The Garden, or since the end of it, rather.”

Aziraphale sits down.

“I don’t… You’ve been in pain, what, just, _always_ , for six thousand years? And you never thought to tell me?”

“Of course I thought about it,” Crowley mutters, and Aziraphale glares at him, but it’s dampened by something. “ _That_ ,” Crowley says, sudden and harsh, “That is exactly why I never brought it up. I don’t want your pity, angel. I don’t.”

“I’ve never pitied you,” Aziraphale begins, and Crowley scoffs.

“Yes, you did,” he says. “The second you stopped being scared out of your mind around me, it was all, ‘oh, poor, misguided demon, all Fallen from Grace, can’t do anything but evil, it’s in his nature, so sad.’ You’ve gotten better about it lately,” he offers begrudgingly, not wanting to start another argument within the existing one, “but I just. Didn’t want to deal with it again. Didn’t want to deal with it from you, on top of the rest of the world.”

“So the rest of the world knows about this, then?” Aziraphale asks quietly, mouth drawn.

“Wha—no, Aziraphale, of course no one else knows. What, you think I’d just go up to Satan like, ‘good afternoon, your Lordship, just wanted you to know that I’ve a particular level of eternal suffering on top of the ones you already knew about, thought that might make your day, sir’?” Aziraphale looks distinctly uncomfortable at the mention of the Prince of Hell, but, well, he started it. Mostly. Sort of. “I meant more in a general sense,” Crowley continues. “You know, society. Inescapable ableism and whatnot.”

“I thought you didn’t read,” Aziraphale says, the corner of his mouth quirking up in spite of himself.

“I don’t read books,” Crowley corrects. “The occasional article, well, maybe.” He figures he’s going to need to extend as many olive branches as he can find, so he adds, “Some of them help. Sometimes quite a lot, actually.”

“Could you—would you print some for me?” Aziraphale asks. “I’d like to understand better.”

“Yeah,” Crowley says, looking at him as long as he can bear. “I’ll do that.”

“Good.” Aziraphale gives that small, tense smile of his, the one that says, _Well, that was uncomfortable but ultimately worth it, thank Heaven it’s over_ , and rests his hands on his knees. “Should—and I’m not patronizing you, my dear, I swear—”

“There’s a first,” Crowley says, but Aziraphale merely rolls his eyes and continues.

“Would you like me to bring you some lunch?”

Crowley carefully lays back down on the couch and studies the ceiling for a moment. “I’m never very hungry, when it’s like this,” he admits quietly. “But if you want to eat in here, I’d—that’d be fine.”

“All right,” Aziraphale says, and gets up and bustles around in the kitchen for a bit, and comes back to sit in the chair by Crowley’s head. He sets down a tray on the antique coffee table; Crowley sees out the corner of his eye that it holds only one sandwich but two mugs of tea.

“You don’t have to drink it right now, of course, my dear,” Aziraphale says. “It’ll warm up just fine.”

**Author's Note:**

> i'm on tumblr @campgender if you want to collectively scream about good omens, or my disability/chronic pain sideblog is @crippleprophet
> 
> update: since a lot of people have said that they headcanon Crowley as having chronic pain and how much it means to them, and several people have mentioned that they’re writing fics where he has chronic pain, I’ve started a collection for them (“SpoonieVaguelyDownwards”). it’s open and unmoderated, so if you have chronic pain and write a piece about Crowley having chronic pain, feel free to add it!

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic of] a culmination of miracles](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20536331) by [carboncopies](https://archiveofourown.org/users/carboncopies/pseuds/carboncopies)




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